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How 'Minecraft Education' will extend building to the classroom

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Minecraft is coming to classrooms -- and officially, rather than just in the hands of bored kids with illicit smartphones. Microsoft has announced an "education edition" of the world-building game will be launched this year.

The game, which has more than 100 million players worldwide, will be relaunched in a brand new education-focused edition, following Microsoft's purchase of MincraftEdu -- a version built especially for classrooms. MinecraftEdu is currently used in 40 countries around the world.

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The new title Minecraft: Education Edition will be available as a free trial later this year with Microsoft promising to offer "an expanded set of features".

As well as the new title and as a way to engage as many teachers as possible Microsoft, which paid £1.8 billion for Mojang, the creator of Minecraft, in 2014, has created a community space for teachers. The platform -- available already at education.minecraft.net -- will allow lesson plans and tutorials to be shared.

Mojang

Microsoft says it will improve the game for teachers and students in a number of different ways, these include:

"We’ve seen that Minecraft transcends the differences in teaching and learning styles and education systems around the world," said Vu Bui, the COO of Mojang.

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"It’s an open space where people can come together and build a lesson around nearly anything.”

However, Minecraft Education won't be completely free to use. Children and teachers will each need an Office 365 ID that can be used to access Microsoft's cloud services. A fee of £3.50 will be charged for each teacher and child that's signed up to the service.